The present invention relates to commercial information processing, and in particular, to an apparatus and method for obtaining and utilizing commercial information from communication networks.
Systems of various configurations are known for obtaining reservation information related to airline flights, lodging, transportation, and the like. Examples of ways to obtain this information include retail travel agencies, travel agency web sites and airline web sites. However, the current methods for obtaining reservation information have many disadvantages.
Conventional travel agencies obtain reservation information from computer terminals which interface to a central reservation system (CRS). By entering cryptic strings into a command line on the computer terminal, an agent can determine the available reservations and book a reservation for a customer. The CRS serves as a clearing house for reservations from many reservation providers. Examples of CRS services include Apollo(trademark) and Sabre(trademark).
Reservations providers maintain systems which communicate with the CRS. For example, an airline has a system which tracks the available seats and the seats that have been reserved. When additional seats become available, the airline system is updated first whereafter the CRS is updated so that travel agencies can reserve these seats for their customers using the updated information in the CRS. Conversely, the CRS notifies the airlines when reservations are made by customers so that they are not also made available to others. In this way, the airlines can effectively market reservations for their seats.
Operation of the travel agencies and CRS services are costly. Customers, in effect, pay the travel agencies for their services because the quoted price of the reservation is inflated by an 8-10% commission. The commission is paid to travel agencies from the profits of the reservation providers. Additionally, reservation providers pay the CRS for providing their service. A fee is paid to the CRS for including a provider""s reservations in the system and for each leg of flight booked with that reservation provider. As can be appreciated the cost of the CRS to the airline is paid by the customer in the form or higher prices. So indirectly, compensation is paid to the travel agencies and the CRS by the customer.
The CRS stores reservation information from many, but not all, reservation providers. For example, most airlines provide reservation information to the CRS, but some low cost and smaller airlines do not, in order to reduce costs. Additionally, some reservation providers who participate in the CRS also market some reservations outside the CRS. These reservations may be distressed inventory and be subject to additional restrictions. Since these reservations do not have the additional cost of the CRS and travel agencies, they are typically sold at discounted rates. The reservations not available to the CRS are collectively referred to xe2x80x9cweb-onlyxe2x80x9d fares. Accordingly, there is a need to provide customers and travel agents web-only reservation information which is not available from the CRS.
The travel agency method for booking a reservation with a CRS is inefficient. For a customer to make a reservation, it must be first communicated from the customer to the travel agency, next from the travel agency to the CRS and finally from the CRS to the reservation provider. Conversely, the accepted reservation must be passed first from the reservation provider to the CRS, next from CRS to the travel agency and finally from the travel agency to the customer. The information chain in which the reservation travels is inefficient and slow. Additionally, the CRS service and travel agency computers must be purchased and maintained for the system to operate properly.
The systems of reservation providers maintain the most current status of their reservations. As those skilled in the art can appreciate, it would be more efficient to only maintain the reservation in a single location. However, the reservation information is replicated in at least the multiple CRS services. To provide reservation information to the CRS, the reservation providers must create specialized software which interfaces their systems with the CRS services. It is desirable for reservation providers to only maintain reservation information on only one system in which all marketing methods may interface to determine the current status of reservations.
With the advent of global computer networks (e.g., the Internet), some travel agencies have replaced the travel agents with web sites. The web sites allow the customer to make queries to the CRS without knowing any of the complex commands previously required. By eliminating the complex interface to the CRS, customers are able to obtain reservations without the assistance of a travel agent. These sites communicate with the CRS which communicates with the reservation providers, in the conventional manner, to book a reservation.
Reservation providers, such as airlines, have also taken advantage of the Internet to market their reservations. A customer can directly book a flight with a reservation provider and avoid the travel agencies and possibly the CRS. The direct booking systems of the reservation providers may or may not be interfaced to the CRS services. Preferably, the reservation providers do not book direct sales through a CRS such that the associated fees are avoided. Further, reservation providers prefer direct sales because reservations are typically not discounted even though the travel agent commission and any CRS fees may be avoided. These savings bolster the profit of the reservation providers.
Customers are typically at a price disadvantage when booking a reservation directly from a reservation provider. With direct sales, it is difficult to determine the cheapest fare because it is difficult to aggregate the fares. To compare prices, the customer must visit many reservation providers and correlate the results themselves in order to determine the best price. This process of comparing prices is time consuming because the web sites for each reservation provider presents their content in an inconsistent way. The CRS is useful in this circumstance because it allows sorting results from many reservation providers based upon predetermined criteria, such as price. Additionally, utilizing a travel agency to book reservations is typically no more costly to the customer than booking directly from the reservation provider. Accordingly, customers see little advantage to using the web sites of reservation providers (or other direct marketing methods) to book reservations from the CRS. However, it is noted once again, web-only fares are not available through the CRS.
As mentioned above, fares not available through CRS services are provided to customers directly. These web-only fares are available by accessing a reservation provider""s web site and are not generally included as part of the CRS. For example, each of the major airlines have recently begun offering web-only fares on their web sites. Additionally, consolidators and other providers of discounted reservations have web sites that offer web-only fares. These web-only fares are typically distressed inventory with additional restrictions. Obtaining these fares is inconvenient to the customer since she has to visit a number of these sites in succession to compare prices (or other criteria) before booking. Comparisons made in this way are time and labor intensive.
Others have recognized the need to compare products or services on the Internet. However, these systems do not address the unique particularities of obtaining and booking reservation information and similar services.
In summary, it appears desirable to develop a system which: (1) decreases the transaction costs and eliminates steps associated with booking a reservation, (2) provides reservation information not available to the CRS, (3) reduces the burden on reservation providers associated with marketing their reservations, and (4) allows comparison of web-only reservation information from a number of reservation providers.
In accordance with the present invention, a method for providing reservation information related to airline flights, lodging, transportation and the like using a communications network is disclosed. In one embodiment, access to a server machine is divided into sessions. During a first session a user machine makes a first request for reservation information from the server machine. This first request includes input data from a first customer which relates to the desired reservation information. For example, the first customer may input travel times in the hopes of booking a flight which corresponds to those times. The server machine requests the reservation information from a number of target sites based upon the input data. Included in the number of target sites is a first and second target sites. The server machine obtains reservation information which includes first and second reservation information respectively from the first and second target sites. Processing software manipulates the reservation information to provide processed reservation information to the user machine. On the user machine, the processed reservation information is presented to the first customer. In this way, the customer""s input data results in processed reservation information being presented to the first customer from a number of target sites.
Relatedly, a server machine for providing processed reservation information to a user machine is disclosed. The processed reservation information is distilled from reservation information obtained from at least a first target site of a number of target sites. The server machine includes a memory subsystem and a processing hardware. Stored in the memory subsystem is customer information which includes first customer information. The first customer information is related to a first session in which reservation information is sought by the user machine. Stored in the memory subsystem is customer information which includes the first customer information. The processing hardware communicates with the memory subsystem that receives a first request for reservation information during the first session. Included in the first request is customer input data from the user machine. The processing hardware formats the customer input data into a first format and relays that information to the first target site. The processing hardware also obtains first reservation information from the first reservation information site and processes the first reservation information to produce processed reservation information. The user machine is provided the processed reservation information. The processing hardware also stores customer information related to a reservation booking by the first customer based upon the first reservation information.
In another embodiment, a method for providing determined information is disclosed. A server machine is accessed by a first user machine. A number of information items are input to the server machine by the first user machine. Additionally, first and second input information are respectively formatted into a first and second formats using the number of informational items. The first input information is used to obtain first output information from a first target site. Similarly, the second input information is used to obtain second output information from a second target site. The obtaining of the first and second output information occurs, at least partially, at the same time. The first and second output information are processed. By using each of said first and second output information, determined information is provided.
Based upon the foregoing summary, a number of important advantages of the present invention are readily discerned. Reservation information can be obtained without needing a CRS or travel agency. Reservation information on target machines, which is not normally part of the CRS, is available to consumers in a way that makes meaningful comparison between a number of target machines possible. The burden on reservation providers is not increased because the server machine uses an unmodified target site to obtain this information.
Additional advantages of the present invention will become readily apparent from the following discussion, particularly when taken together with the accompanying drawings.